Researchers from TU Delft (the Netherlands), University of Barcelona, and Harvard University have now developed the first swarm of tiny – and hence very safe – drones that can autonomously detect and localize gas sources in cluttered indoor environments.

The ability of a cell to separate its own matter from its surroundings is a basic requirement for life. A team of researchers at AMOLF and Delft University of Technology have managed to create a synthetic container, or lipid vesicle, that is able to hold a range of different biological systems: from a cytoskeleton to entire E.coli bacteria. Their findings on this optimized cDICE method, which has the potential to reveal the inner workings of life, are published in ACS Synthetic Biology on DATE.

“Last year was a very interesting year. To my mind, TU Delft is a stable environment. COVID-19 meant that without warning, things that had been optimised had to be organised differently. There was suddenly room to be more creative with processes. I found this invigorating. My group showed itself to be very flexible and managed to adapt in no time. In addition to experimenting, we started focusing on modelling and machine learning, for example.

Lunar Zebro, an ambitious team at TU Delft will work together with TNO (The Netherlands Organization for Applied Scientific Research) to build the lightest and smallest Moon rover to date.

For the first time, Delft researchers have succeeded in making a three-dimensional image of a cellular component using light. The component in question is the nuclear pore complex: tunnels that facilitate traffic to and from the cell nucleus. Studying cell components in 3D can help to determine the cause of various diseases, among other things. The researchers have published their findings in Nature Communications.

How does our brain work? An international team of researchers, including lead author Daan Brinks of TU Delft, has taken another step towards answering that question. They have created a new tool that allows them to image electrical signals in brains with an unprecedented combination of precision, resolution, sensitivity, and depth.

A microscope used by Antoni van Leeuwenhoek to conduct pioneering research contains a surprisingly ordinary lens, as new research by Rijksmuseum Boerhaave Leiden and TU Delft shows. It is a remarkable finding, because Van Leeuwenhoek (1632-1723) led other scientists to believe that his instruments were exceptional. Consequently, there has been speculation about his method for making lenses for more than three centuries. The results of this study were published in Science Advances on May 14.